STAFF WORKING for a Spanish catering company which runs four cafés and bars at Lisbon’s Portela Airport say they may stage a further walk-out if negotiations over conditions on September 18 reach deadlock.
Eighty contracted staff staged a 48-hour strike on Wednesday September 3 and Thursday, September 4, over what they claim are appalling work conditions where holidays are not respected, staff are expected to snatch a lunch break in the corridors by the lifts, and other alleged repressions.
Maria das Dores Gomes of the Hotel Industry Workers Union, which represents catering employees, told The Resident: “This was not a strike over wages but rather working conditions which are not being honoured according to the law or their contracts.
“Employers are not respecting the workers’ basic rights in terms of lunch breaks, booked holiday time and disciplinary processes,” she said.
The union has already had a round-table meeting with the Spanish-owned Unitrato where workers’ concerns “fell on deaf ears”.
“We have received a number of concerns from the airport’s company ANA itself on the issue and they have demanded explanations from Unitrato and have scheduled a further meeting with them on September 18 and a meeting with employees prior to that,” she explained, adding that she felt sure the strike “had a serious impact”.
One restaurant and one café were shut during the strike over which the union accuses the company of “initiating various disciplinary processes against the staff”.
The Resident attempted, unsuccessfully, to contact Unitrato, which has been unavailable to make statements to the press.
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